Transforming the Border Wall into a Teeter Totter, Rael San Fratello, ARTIST STORIES

Since the early 2000s, architects Ronald Rael and Virginia San Fratello (Rael San Fratello) have developed numerous proposals for interventions and alternatives to the United StatesMexico border wall. Many of their designs were inspired by stories of people who, on both sides of the border, transform the wall, challenging its existence in remarkably creative ways. Their work reimagines the wall in ways that range from playful (volleyball net) and infrastructural (solar panels) to natural (cactus wall). The borderlands have been an evolving context, as Ronald Rael says. There was a time when there was no wall. There was a time when the wall was just an idea for national security. There was a time when the wall began to be proposed. And now there s a time when the wall is clearly fixed within our cultural identity. Recent actions to extend the wall and separate families seeking asylum at the border prompted Rael San Fratello to bring one of their proposals to life. On July 28, 2019, they installed th